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Dolan Prem
Dolan Prem is a controversial Bajoran political figure and former Starfleet captain. He is currently standing as candidate for First Minister of the New Bajoran Ministry and is unofficially allied with the Free State of Rura Penthe. He is played by Rick Baer. Personal History Early Life Dolan Aren and Litsa met and were married as members of the resistance during the Cardassian occupation. Following the war, they both went into politics, becoming diplomats for Dahkur Province. Their son, Prem, was born in the Bajoran capital of Ashalla, as were his two younger brothers. Despite a life of privilege, Aren and Litsa made sure their children remained humble. Prem’s brothers decided to live according to traditional Bajoran beliefs. Prem, on the other hand, decided to leave Bajor and join Starfleet after spending some time on Deep Space 9. Starfleet Career Over a twenty year Starfleet career, Dolan Prem distinguished himself as a hard-edged diplomat. During his rise to the rank of Commander, Dolan oversaw the admittance of seven separate Federation member worlds - but his stalwart adherance to the Bajoran religion marked him as an outsider to the generally secular Starfleet Command. Rise to Captain In 2409, Commander Dolan was assigned to facilitate the admittance of Nauriscaa into the Federation. Upon his arrival aboard the USS Challenger, Dolan engaged the Nausicaan leadership at G'rak Toa - and discovered a divided political situation between Prime Se'telkon and the opposition leader Ko'Kanros. On the second day of negotiations, the transport shuttlecraft carrying Dolan Prem, Lt. Commander Nezak, and Ko'Kanros underwent a massive systems failure and crashlanded in the Great Nausicaan Plain. Nearly a week later, Dolan and Nezak emerged from the Great Plain, both gravely injured. Within 24 hours, Dolan Prem had initiated Naursicaan membership to the Federation. This victory was widely credited with Dolan's rise to Captain. In 2410, Dolan Prem was assigned to command the USS London. His fellow survivor, Nezak, was promoted to Commander and assigned as the London's first officer. From 2410-2420, Captain Dolan and the London were tasked with the exploration of the Beta Quadrant frontier, surveying primarily the Hobus Supernebula, the Klingon Neutral Zone, and Iconian relic worlds. During this period, Captain Dolan persisted in his religious practices despite his separation from Bajor. The Discovery of Shar'Kil'A'Kil In 2420, Captain Dolan was tasked by Admiral Beckett to investigate the frontier world designated Caltos VII. The mission's sister ship, the Vulcan vessel Valkuul, was missing from the rendezvous. The London observed that the planet was encased in a planetary energy shield, preventing transport onto the planet. After deactivating the shield's power source, located on an ancient satellite in planetary orbit, Captain Dolan led an away team to the surface of Caltos VII. There he made a tremendous discovery: a living, breathing Iconian who identified himself as Shar'Kil'A'Kil. After attacking the away team and triggering a seismic event, Shar'Kil'A'Kil made for an Iconian Gateway. Captain Prem gave chase, ordering the successful transport of the Iconian into the London's brig. Once there, Shar'Kil'A'Kil used powerful telekenesis to attack the London with two more Klingon Birds of Prey, as well as the Vulkuul. The London destroyed all three vessels, but saved the crew of the Valkuul. Upon returning to the London, Captain Prem was ordered by Starfleet Command to transport the Iconian directly to Vulcan for study, along with the Vulcan refugees. In his captain's log, Dolan reflected on these orders. : "I've never been, shall we say, popular in Starfleet, and I'm not usually prone to stepping out of line or defying orders. However, in this case, the risks are simply too high. The current atmosphere of paranoia surrounding Federation government and Starfleet policy leads me to believe that the Iconian will be used in such a way as to determine his military value. Stories of Iconians, likening them to demons, have survived for 200,000 years. After the events of today, I'm inclined to believe there is some truth in the stories. I only hope that my decision to defy Starfleet pays off and we are not all killed." Upon arrival at Vulcan, Captain Dolan broke with orders and only deposited the Vulcan survivors and the London's civilian population, keeping the Iconian for himself. In an attempt to better understand Shar'Kil'A'Kil, Captain Dolan engaged directly with the prisoner, then ordered the London to Tzenketh, as the gateway on Caltos VII had been directed at that planet. The Tzenketh Incident In 2420, Tzenketh had been occupied by the Breen Confederacy for nearly fifteen years. When Captain Dolan arrived, the London found itself staring down a Breen armada. Despite a history of diplomatic service, this was Captain Dolan's first encounter with the Breen - and he was told to leave sovereign Breen space. However, Shar'Kil'A'Kil insisted on transporting to the surface of the planet - and the London detected a Starfleet transponder on the planet as well. To serve both goals, the London initiated a diversionary cyberattack on the Breen communications network, convincing the Breen that they were under Starfleet attack in many nearby systems. The London then engaged multiple Breen vessels, crippling them and holding the commanding Breen Captain hostage until permission to transport to the planet was given. While members of Dolan's crew went after the transponder (recovering former Federation Diplomatic Officer Seruu Shran), Captain Dolan accompanied Shar'Kil'A'Kil to his destination. There, he discovered a Bajoran religious artifact: a long-lost Orb of the Prophets. The Tzenketh Incident is widely credited with the initiation of open warfare between the Breen Confederacy and the United Federation of Planets, including the Breen offensive on Bajor. The Bajoran Genocide (or the Battle of Bajor) With the Iconian and the newfound Orb in tow, Captain Dolan set course for Bajor. Along the way, the London was intercepted by Captain Sadayan Gel and the USS Taluno. The Taluno were on orders to bring in Captain Dolan and his command staff for insubordination, and Captain Dolan was formally relieved of command. However, the London's crew continued to follow Dolan's orders; the London fired on the Taluno, crippling the vessel and allowing the London to proceed to Bajor. The Taluno's tactical officer, Kara Dax, stowed away aboard the London and was placed in the brig on Dolan's orders. Upon arrival at Bajor, Captain Dolan beamed to the surface of the planet alongside Shar'Kil'A'Kil, Seruu Shran, and Kara Dax. With a rapidly approaching Breen armada, They immediately proceeded to the Temple of the Prophets, where an unknown Vedek explained that the orb recovered on Tzenketh was none other than the Orb of Destruction - the key to a powerful weapon spoken of in the scrolls of the Kosst Amojan that could be used to protect Bajor from the incoming threat. The Iconian Shar'Kil'A'Kil disagreed, asking to be allowed to bring the Orb through the long-locked Door of the Celestial Temple. At this moment, the USS London took fire from the Breen Armada and began plummeting towards the planet. A religious man, Dolan Prem did not trust the Kosst Amojan, and so instead bargained with Shar'Kil'A'Kil. The Iconian agreed to save the London using his telekenesis in exchange for admittance into the Celestial Temple. Before Shar'Kil'A'Kil could complete this task, however, he was murdered by the rogue Jem'Hadar known as Zero. Dolan Prem, now desperate for any way to save his homeworld, allowed the Orb of Destruction to be placed among the other Orbs, initiating the weapon of the Prophets. : "Now I only had one option: I placed the Orb of Destruction on the empty pedestal. What came next… I've never experienced anything like it. The Orbs went dark and the ground shook. The sound… you couldn't hear it. You felt it. In your very bones. There was an energy release. It ripped apart the upper levels of the Temple and went into space. I quietly prayed the Breen fleet would be destroyed and Bajor would be saved. But the energy beam was not a weapon. It was a beacon. Hundreds of Crystalline Entities entered Bajoran space." A beacon was activated from beneath the Temple of the Prophets, sending a vibrational signal into deep space. Within moments, nearly one hundred Crystalline Entities swarmed the planet - attacking and devouring every piece of organic tissue they could find, including the entire Breen fleet. Dolan ordered the destruction of the temple, achieved by Seruu Shran, and then proceeded with Kara Dax to a ship hidden on the surface of the planet: The Defiant, a Section 31 covert affairs vessel under Dax's command. As the population of Bajor was annihilated by the Crystalline Entity swarm, Dolan Prem escaped alongside Dax, Sec31 agents Garak, Julian Bashir, Data LaForge, and former crew members Lissan and Seruu Shran. They managed to save nearly 25 survivors from the London. From his records: : "My people are dead. My world is dead. My home and everything I hold dear are gone. Some once considered me a hero of Bajor. Now I am the agent of its destruction. : May the Prophets forgive me, for surely no one else will." The Breen Offensive Section 31 Operations In the six months following the Battle of Bajor, Dolan Prem was declared a war criminal by Starfleet Command and became the center of a Quadrant-wide manhunt. During this period, Dolan joined the clandestine organization Section 31 and was appointed first officer to the Defiant by that organization's leader, Section Prime. Their task: to dismantle the Breen war machine and drive the Breen from the Federation border. In return, Dolan was promised revenge on Zero Godkiller for the events at the Temple of the Prophets. In early 2421, the Defiant arrived at Ferengenar in order to procure multiphasic shielding technology from the Ferengi. During a tense military standoff with the isolationist Ferengi, Dolan Prem negotiated directly with Grand Nagus Rom. Ultimately, the multi-phasic shielding was acquired for Section 31 by trading a copy of the recently retrofitted Shran Battery to the Ferengi. Nearly a month later, the Defiant was tasked with infiltrating the new Breen Terraforming Station above Tzenketh. Without their interferance, the platform would rapidly begin terraforming the Tzenkethi homeworld for Breen use, effectively wiping out the Tzenkethi race. Dolan Prem boarded the vessel alongside Seruu Shran, who managed to lead a slave revolt on the platform and ultimately kill the Breen Thot on the station's command center. However, Section Prime's orders were not to stop the terraforming, but to rather use the platform to re-engineer the planet to be uninhabitable. This would destroy both the Tzenkethi race and the Breen beachhead. From his personal records: : "Section Prime's idea of the greater good centers around the Federation and its core races. No one else. Believing the Tzenkethi and Breen to be threats to the Federation in the long term, he ordered me to irradiate Tzenketh, annihilating the Tzenkethi and the Breen occupying force and making the planet permanently uninhabitable. In return, he offered the full services of Section 31 to the rebuilding and repopulating of Bajor as well as "guaranteed" revenge against those responsible for Bajor's annihilation. : Section Prime offered me the only things that have been driving me since Bajor's destruction. The things I had rededicated my life to doing. All I had to do was press a button and destroy another world. : I told him to go to hell." Dolan Prem broke with Section 31 orders, terraforming the planet back to Tzenkethi primacy as Kara Dax opened fire on the platform on Section Prime's orders. With the aid of Lissan Shran, Seruu Shran, and a team of four Tzenkethi resistence fighters, Dolan transported to the Defiant and imprisoned the Section 31 crew. Declaring himself Captain, Dolan was contacted by the Tzenkethi Primarch Utori Krissal and hailed as a hero of the Tzenkethi people. With an armada of Tzenkethi Blockships and Warmasters at his back, Captain Dolan set course for the Breen border. The Escape of Kara Dax During the trip into Breen space, the Defiant was intercepted by another former Section 31 vessel: the Alpha Flyer, piloted by Tom Paris and Breen smuggler Codek. Understanding that the Defiant had broken with Section 31 orders, Paris and Codek offered their assistance in bringing an end to the Breen invasion. However, during this negotiation, the security protocols on the Defiant were overridden by Section Prime and Kara Dax was allowed to escape the ship's brig. Hijacking the Alpha Flyer, Kara Dax engaged the Defiant in combat and escaped to warp. Tom Paris followed in a smaller ship, the Delta Flyer. Codek became Captain Dolan's primary channel into Breen affairs, revealing that the Breen were not a single race, but rather seven distinct species and cultures. This would prove instrumental in solving the crisis. The Battle of Porta Brak After another two months of preparation and travel, Captain Dolan reached the Breen border. This border was built from automated mines, designed for rapid expansion of borders at the press of a button. However, with the aid of Lissan Shran, Seruu Shran and Codek, the mines' command codes were decrypted and towed towards the forward Breen military base at Porta Brak. During this period, Dolan entered negotiations with one of the seven Breen races, the Pej Roak. Their leader, Thot Gor, made a pact with Captain Dolan - his men would stand by on the Porta Brak facility and await Dolan's attack, then take the facility from within and kill the Xilk Tre Thot that commanded the station. In a week's time, Dolan led the attack against Porta Brak. The battle is noteable for its casualty differential - the Tzenkethi lost only a few thousand, while nearly 100,000 Breen were slaughtered by their own men. However, despite this victory, Dolan Prem did not yet advance on the Breen Homeworld. By staying at the remains of Porta Brak, Dolan impressed upon the Breen the control he carried over the situation. The Breen responded to this show of force by tasking twenty cruisers to treat with Dolan, led by the great warrior Thot Sezen. Dolan was taken into custody, ordering the Tzenkethi fleet to remain while the Shran sisters followed in the cloaked Defiant. The Fall of the Bota Rez Dolan Prem was deposited on the Breen Homeworld, the first non-allied lifeform to ever step foot on the planet. The only existing records come from his personal logs: : The Breen homeworld is a jungle. Green and orange spires poke out through the dense trees. The holographic propaganda signs covering many of the buildings portrayed the Bota Res as kind and uplifting, helping the weak and hungry. They also portrayed me as a vicious killer and destroyer of worlds. Somehow I think that may have actually worked in my favor. : Before entering the Great Hall, I was confronted by a man I would soon find out was Thot Yeris of the Tzilk Tre, councillor for the warrior class. His brother was one of the Breen killed in my attack on Porta Brek. I attempted to remain composed as he beat me, but I fear I may have just come off as smug, which encouraged him to continue beating me. Another Breen, I assume the Thot's servant, convinced him to stop and let me enter the Hall to stand trial. : The seven councillors of the Breen sit in a great arc, elevated high above the main floor. I was placed in the center, all eyes in the massive circular room focused squarely on me. Thot Zakah, of the Bota Res (and therefore defacto leader of the Breen), asked why I, being of the Federation, would bring war upon the Breen. (I'm not of the Federation, technically, but I don't think he would've seen the distinction.) I told him I brought war to the Breen because the Breen have brought war to the rest of the galaxy. They, of course, don't see it that way. They believe they are expanding for the glory of all Breen and that they are taking what should be theirs (including inhabited worlds). After less than an hour on the Breen homeworld it became clear to me that the Bota Res agenda drives everything in Breen politics, and the other races simply serve them. : I extrapolated: if Breen expansion were to continue, they would soon come into conflict with the other major races of the galaxy, ones that could actually put up a fight. With their military in such disarray, stretching it thin across the galaxy would bring ruin upon all Breen. At this, Thot Choda (of the Choda Besk) began to consider the logic of what I was saying. I began to appeal to the other Thots, attempting to convince each one of them that they had enormous power over the fate of the Breen Confederacy. Without the Pej Roak, who would build their cities and warships. Without the Tzilk Tre, who would conquer for Breen glory and defend them while under attack. Without the Yek Tanta their economy would collapse. Without the Kathu Dar their empire's morale would plummet. The loss of any one of these races could potentially spell doom for all Breen. : That got them thinking. Finally. : A few of the Thots stood up and spoke out against Thot Zakah. The table at which the Thots sit is rigged to deliver a debilitating electrical current at the press of a button. It is Thot Zakah who presses the button. I told them that if they needed any evidence for my claim that the Bota Res are subjugating all the other races, that was as clear as it could get. They seemed to agree. I was beginning to destabilize a political system that had been in place for centuries using logic barely worthy of a Vulcan child. Finally, I said the Breen Confederacy could truly be one people, just as the Bota Res claimed they were, but it could not happen as long as the Bota Res were in charge. At this moment, a five-ship Section 31 armada arrived at the Breen Homeworld with an experimental weapon later discovered to be a Crystalline Entity Lure. Dolan Prem was beamed back aboard the Defiant, raced back to Porta Brak with the ships in pursuit, and engaged the armada with the Tzenkethi fleed, destroying one of the vessels. He then returned to the Breen Homeworld in an attempt to stop the Lure from being activated and genociding the Breen. Through a desperate gambit involving transporters and mines, the Section 31 Lure was destroyed and the other ships either crippled or scuttled. Dolan Prem then returned to the surface of the planet, posing as a Federation envoy, to sign a treaty of non-aggression between the United Federation of Planets and the Breen Confederacy. The validity of this pact is still in doubt, as the current New Breen Confederation has exterminated the Bota Rez subspecies after their intentions were made clear by Dolan Prem. The Breen incursion into the Alpha Quadrant had ended. Dolan Prem was intercepted by the USS Defiant-C, commanded by Admiral Beckett, who requested Dolan Prem return to Earth for court martial at the behest of new Federation President K'Tolka. Dolan agreed, securing pardons for Lissan and Seruu Shran in the process. Court Martial and Return to Caltos VII The Bajoran Re-Settlement & Ministerial Election Personality & Appearance